More reasons to not worry about DX10.1

Extremetech has a thorough review of the new ATI chip the RV670, in its R3870 form here. And it states this about DX10.1:

“A quick word about DirectX 10.1, which is coming to Vista users with Service Pack 1 early in 2008: While this is the first chip to support the new API standard, and AMD is likely to make a big deal about that, you shouldn’t really get too excited. DX 10.1 makes some of the things that were optional in DX10 mandatory (like 32-bit texture filtering), and it adds a few new nice little wrinkles that could be of use to developers, but it’s certainly not going to be “the next big thing.” We don’t expect many games to support DirectX 10.1 for awhile yet, and all the games that do will also support regular DX10. In most cases, you’ll hardly be able to see any difference between them (the DX10.1 version might run slightly faster, or have a better anti-aliasing option, for example). It’s a nice feather in AMD’s cap to be the first to support it, but don’t let it be a big factor in your buying decision”

Which is in agreement with the advice I have been giving for months, it is just another minor version rev of DX and no big deal.

a) DX10 has no native games because they are all simply DX9 ports with a few extra bells and whistles. So, how is DX10.1 going to solve this?

b) Our nice shiny £360 DX10 compatible graphic cards are now rendered somewhat obsolete by this upgrade. Yeah, we can still run DX10 games, but as detailed in your post they are going to run slower than new graphics cards which meet the DX10.1 standard. I guess that the DX10.1 cards will run at the speeds that DX10 users were expecting.

Each card becomes "obsolete" with a few months by something new which runs faster. This is a normal situation int the field of computers for many years now.

If the update would be called DX 10.0a (like updates to DX 9 were), would people be less upset? 🙂

I agree the little DX10 native adoption may be seen as a problem, but I fail to see how is it related to a few more improvements available in 10.1. Sooner or later, there will be no more DX 9 cards manufactured, and no more DX 9 OS sold. Now it seems it will be later than MS and GPU vendors expected (or wanted), but again, how is this related to 10.1?

"Each card becomes "obsolete" with a few months by something new which runs faster. This is a normal situation int the field of computers for many years now."

I don’t think there are any cards which have been released which renders 8800 or 3800 cards obsolete. There are different versions, yes, but what they can do is the same, some of them just do it faster.

I have always been pro MS which is why I upgraded to Vista when it was first released, but the Vista, DX10 and FSX fiascos have rapidly changed my mind.

"Somehow, this "no big deal" blog entry forces me to visit Ebay^^ Especially if i think of the Nvidia driver-related issues with XPack…"

I must admit that I don’t have any issues with my 8800GTX using Nvidia’s current drivers. And to be honest contrary to my previous posts for other blog entries on SP2 I am actually starting to warm to the "DX10 Preview". With some tweaking to my settings I am getting 30 FPS in low populated areas and 10-15 FPS in densely populated areas. The only graphical area where I need to compromise is the quality of water. The much heralded DX10 cockpit shadow effects are dire and add nothing to the simulation other than probably dropping the frame rate a couple of notches.

"I don’t blame ACES for DX10. Nobody appears to be what I would call successful with DX10 at this time. Everybody that runs it takes a large performance hit."

All I think Microsoft is doing by releasing dx10.1 is because dx10 was suppose to be a set standerd. what i mean by standard is: If you have dx10 – you can play this game – no question. But dx10.0 didn’t turn out that way – nvidia released the crapy low end 8500/ 8400 cards. So to run dx10 like it is supposed to be played, Microsoft is just telling you – you must buy a dx10.1 capable card. Which I think is a good move by Microsoft. If you have a good card now – the 8800, no need to wory.

What I would be curious about is… if the new 8800GT (DX10) and the ATI 3850/70(DX10.1) both address the stuttering – pause/ skip issues that is almost always present on anything DX10 related and in particular if the ATI does being 10.1 compliant and DX10 compatible

If this doesn’t make sense… does the upgraded hardware/ shader fix the stuttering problem I’ve seen reports of everywhere

Your CPU isn’t the best. Perhaps overclocking gives you a few more fps. I’m happy with the fps i get, but i wait for cheaper Intel Quads to get FSX hopefully really smooth.

@Steve,

you didn’t used your graphics card?

Your card isn’t DX10.1 compliant and nobody forced you to buy this card.

But you will get enough money back from Ebay to buy a DX10.1 card, if DX10.1 is important for you.

I doubt that the HD 3870 would be better for you. It’s only sure, that the new Radeon cards have the best price performance ratio for mid-range cards, so i think i will get rid of my inefficient and loud GTS. But your GTX has still more power..

I’m pretty happy with the fps I get in game. Its smooth enough to be playable and looks good enough for me.

I probably will upgrade my CPU at some point in the near future, but as I can play most current games with settings maxed out at the maximum resolution of my monitor I am happy at the moment. (the use of "most" excludes FSX and Crysis, but includes HL2EP2, Quake Wars and Bioshock)

I think you misunderstood Steve’s point which was he has really only been using the card for DX9 games and applications, because games and applications that use DX10 have not been forthcoming or use DX10 badly. Accordingly he has not been using the card to its full or advertised potential.

This raises the question of what is the problem with DX10 that its application in games has been so poor? There are three possibilities:-

But he used his card and it doesn’t matter for what, so no money back, only selling or not selling 🙂

I bought also the "wrong" card because i was impatient and curious, but it was my decision. I’m not sure what i will do now, because the most benchmarks with the AMD cards are without AA and there is no need for a DX10.1 capable card ATM.

It’s only the efficiency and the hope that their drivers and image quality will bring a improvement for FSX. And if i wait too long, the price of my GTS will drop heavily…

If microsoft made it absolutely clear from the start that their FSX was not actually Dx10 ready than many others and myself included would not have bought the 8800GTX, its not a case of "being forced into buying the card" they were just the cause of one buying it, just to see on screen when loading the game –

"A RUNNING PROGRAM IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH CERTAIN ELEMENTS OF WINDOWS"

"If microsoft made it absolutely clear from the start that their FSX was not actually Dx10 ready than many others and myself included would not have bought the 8800GTX, its not a case of "being forced into buying the card" they were just the cause of one buying it, just to see on screen when loading the game –

"A RUNNING PROGRAM IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH CERTAIN ELEMENTS OF WINDOWS"

Couple things here:

1. The 8800’s are the best cards out for DX9 apps too – there’s really no reason you should have bought anything else.

2. The switch to Vista Basic when running FS has nothing to do with DX10 support. It happens on all video cards and all versions of FSX. I’m not entirely sure why they disable Aero like that – no other game I’ve tried in Vista does that including FS9.

And now Nvidia announce the 9 series cards which will be DX10.1 compatible. Things move on, but as there isn’t anyone having a good experience using DX10 with existing cards, could we please have that sorted out first?

Who knows, maybe Nvidia will allow 8 series users to trade in their cards for a nice shiny new 9 series card? And the price of bacon might rise!

I know I choose to buy a DX10.0 compliant card, but this is now completely beyond a joke. I won’t upgrade so quickly and blindly again. I will wait and see how DX10 and the associated hardware performs before committing.

RE. the preceding two posts, there are a number of games that now use DX10, including Crysis, World in Conflict, Call of Juarez. There are others as well, but these are just a few. And some people are having a good experience with their DX10 games. From what I’ve read, 10.1 will be an incremental increase, and DX10 cards certainly won’t be obsolete any time soon. I’m not aware of any games at this time that are DX10.1.

Archcarrier, I never said that those games play better or faster in DX10. I have no argument with you there at all. All I’m saying is that there are other DX10 games that are out there and don’t need any updates, and some people are very happy playing them in DX10. I play World in Conflict just fine on my 8800GTS 640 in DX10/Vista Home Premium (DS3, e6600 at 3.2GHz, 2g ram, raptor) with no framerate problems whatsoever. It played DX10 right out of the box.

No, my point is that, here we are, almost a year later, and FSX still is not DX10 after months of "an update to DX10 is coming soon", while other DX10 titles are rolling out.

"DirectX 10 Support – Flight Simulator X: Acceleration uses the power of Windows Vista and DirectX 10 to deliver breathtaking graphics and dynamic environments to immerse you in the world of flight."

I raised this with Phil in a previous blog entry, but he did not address my point. In my view the statement above is not fulfilled by the DX10 Preview. The statement says DX10 Support, it does not say DX10 Preview and I’d really like to hear what Phil has to say about that?

My guess is that MS pulled the plug on further time and funding for FSX development and as a result the DX10 features and SP2 upgrade were compromised, so that Acceleration could be completed prior to christmas.

Many people are now excited about the promise of FS11 in a few years time, but the price we’ve paid is our FSX experience now.